In recent years, mixtures of nutmeats, cereals and/or dried or sugar-infused fruits have become popular as snacks or quick energy foods. Mixtures which contain nuts, cereals, such as granola, and fruit are commonly referred to as trail mixes or trail mixtures. Due to difficulties associated in packaging and preserving such loose mixtures of differently textured and sized ingredients, methods have been sought to bind the various ingredients into food bars which are convenient to handle and consume and which may be easily packaged, shipped and displayed.
One form of this food product is the nut bar which typically consists of nutmeats bound together by an edible matrix. The most common matrix for this type of food bar is formed almost entirely of sucrose which is applied to the nuts as a syrup and which becomes crystalline upon evaporation of the water. Such bars thus rapidly develop a crunchy, crisp texture upon storage.
Another form of a ready-to-eat food bar is the granola bar which typically consists of a major portion of granola, e.g., rolled oats and/or wheat, and minor amounts of fruit and/or nuts. These bars are commonly cemented by a baked cookie-type matrix comprising crumbs of the cereal product saturated with sugar and vegetable oils. Similar bars replace a part or all of the granola with other processed cereals such as puffed wheat or rice. These bars are typically dry and friable in texture. Such fat-occluded food compositions are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,055,669.
On the opposite range of the textual scale are gelatin-based marshmallow-type matrices such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,145,448 which may be used to bind cereal products and vitamins. Such products are spongy and sticky in texture, and do not possess optimal binding properties for ranch-mix type products.
Ranch mixes typically comprise whole or halved nutmeats and large fruit fragments. Due to the larger size and weight of these materials, the physical properties of the binder required to firmly join them into a flexible bar must be carefully adjusted.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide an edible binder for mixtures of nuts, fruits and/or cereal pieces which allows such mixes, e.g., trail mixes, to be bound into bars.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a binder composition which acts to bind trail mix ingredients into a flexible, elastic bar without imparting undue stickiness to the bound mixture.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a binder composition which will preserve the moistness and biologically stabilize a mixture of fruits, nuts and cereal.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a plastic binder composition which is a suitable matrix for food bars comprising large, e.g., whole or halved, nutmeats.